Payroll in Latvia: a restricted activity

Latvia is a member of the European Union and of the euro area: wages are paid in euros, the EU social security coordination rules apply, and a posting from another Member State is arranged within the common framework. What makes Latvia unusual lies elsewhere.

The tax authority, the Valsts ieņēmumu dienests (VID, State Revenue Service), collects both income tax withheld at source and compulsory social contributions, the VSAOI; the Valsts sociālās apdrošināšanas aģentūra (VSAA, State Social Insurance Agency) is involved only on the benefits side. There is therefore a single collecting body, and a single certificate to obtain.

The second peculiarity is rarer still within the Union: keeping accounts for a third party, payroll included, is a licensed activity. The provider must be registered as an ārpakalpojuma grāmatvedis, an outsourced accountant, on the register maintained by the VID. Latvian, finally, is the official language and the one in which the authorities expect employment documents.

The employee enrolment declaration must be made before work actually begins, not afterwards. This is actively checked, and nothing can be submitted in Latvia without an open access to the electronic filing system.

The VID registers the employer and opens that access. It is also the body that will receive, each month, a single return covering both withheld tax and contributions.

An entity is not always necessary: in certain configurations a foreign company may register as an employer in Latvia without establishing a structure there. That route affects the reporting burden and sometimes the identity of the party liable for contributions; it is a decision to take, not a default to accept.

Written and drafted in Latvian, the contract admits a bilingual version, but the Latvian text will govern in a dispute. It must contain the particulars set out in the Labour Law, and omissions work against the employer.

The payslip is a document the employee may demand and must set out the calculation. Check the treatment of personal allowances, which depend on the position the employee has declared to the authorities.

Accrued leave, applicable notice, any severance and the employee's removal from the employment register close the file, each step being evidenced in the same electronic system.

The outsourced accountant licence dominates everything else. Latvia is one of the few Member States where entrusting payroll to an unlicensed provider is not merely unwise but irregular; the register of licence holders is public and verification takes minutes. The licence carries a professional indemnity insurance requirement, which here is a legal obligation rather than a contractual preference.

The VID publishes company tax debts above a floor amount in open data. A client can accordingly check for itself the standing of its provider or of its own establishment, without having to request a certificate from anyone.

The Latvian-language requirement for employment documents is applied consistently, including in businesses whose day-to-day working language is Russian or English. A convenience translation does not dispense with the Latvian version, and inspectors read the Latvian one.